Analysis: McKinney faces GOP

John Hanna

Sunday

Sep 26, 2010 at 11:37 AM

The biggest issue facing state Treasurer Dennis McKinney in trying to keep his job might be that he is a Democrat in Republican-leaning Kansas, running in what is supposed to be a great year for the GOP.

Even Republican nominee Ron Estes, who says he can make the office more efficient, isn't critical of McKinney. They don't appear to have much policy to debate, other than the long-term health of the pension fund for Kansas teachers and government workers, and both agree it is a serious issue.

In the past, state treasurers have been a good bet for re-election, regardless of party. An incumbent treasurer hasn't lost since 1972, when Republican Walter Peery was defeated in the primary.

But McKinney is making his first run for statewide office. He has been treasurer only since January 2009, after his appointment by then-Democratic Gov. Kathleen Sebelius to replace Lynn Jenkins, a Republican who resigned to take a seat in Congress.

Kansas Republicans have talked for months about a "clean sweep" of statewide and congressional races. They expect voters to vent their frustration with the economy, President Barack Obama and fellow Democrats who control Congress.

"Under normal circumstances which means barring some sort of scandal the incumbent treasurer is usually considered a lock," said Bob Beatty, a Washburn University political scientist. "That's not the case this year."

McKinney, a 50-year-old farmer from Greensburg, served in the Kansas House for 16 years. He was its minority leader when Sebelius appointed him treasurer.

Estes is Sedgwick County's treasurer, having been elected in 2004 and re-elected in 2008, unopposed both times. Before that, he was a computer project and quality control manager for several companies, including Learjet Inc. and Koch Industries.

The state treasurer keeps Kansas government's books, manages its funds and serves on the board of the Kansas Public Employees Retirement System, or KPERS.

That last duty led Estes to raise the pension fund's long-term financial problems as an issue last week. KPERS valued its assets at $11.8 billion at the start of this year, about 64 percent of what it would need to cover its obligations to some 260,000 current and future retirees, leaving a gap of nearly $7.7 billion.

Estes promised to be "a champion for KPERS" and proposed forming a working group to propose solutions. McKinney noted that KPERS and two legislative committees are discussing such issues now.

Meanwhile, the most visible operations of the treasurer's office are Kansas Learning Quest, a state-sponsored college-savings program for families, and another program that helps people find unclaimed property.

After the last fiscal year ended June 30, McKinney reported that he had left $65,000 of his annual budget unspent, or about 1.6 percent, by using new technology and eliminating the equivalent of two full-time jobs. His office also returned a record $14.6 million of unclaimed property.

McKinney also has the endorsement of the Kansas Farm Bureau.

"I have a lot of bipartisan support," McKinney said. "They wouldn't be behind me if we didn't have a solid record."

McKinney needs some GOP support because registered Republicans outnumber registered Democrats in Kansas by better than 3-to-2.

As a legislator, McKinney opposed abortion and supported construction of a proposed coal-fired power plant in southwest Kansas. That helped him with GOP voters, even if it put him at odds with Sebelius' positions.

Estes picked up Jenkins' endorsement last week. She praised him for making his county office more efficient, saying he has returned more than $1.5 million from his annual budgets over five years.

He said his business background will prompt him to focus on making the state treasurer's office more efficient.

"I don't know that there's a particular issue in terms of things that have gone wrong," Estes said. "It's more of, how do we focus on delivering?"

Such questions didn't strike some Kansas policymakers as compelling in the past. The administrative nature of the office led to a push in the 1970s to have the treasurer appointed by the governor.

But then-State Treasurer Joan Finney, a Democrat, boosted her career enough by vigorously fighting those efforts that the issue died remaining a nonstarter today.

Then, Finney was elected governor in 1990. Another treasurer, Tim Shallenburger, was the unsuccessful GOP nominee for governor in 2002, and Jenkins won two treasurer's races before capturing the 2nd Congressional District seat for eastern Kansas in 2008.

By winning this year's election, McKinney would become a threat to run for higher office later, another reason for the GOP to push for its clean sweep. Some Republicans also grumbled about having the office fall into a Democrat's hands without an election.

"If he loses and there was no scandal and he didn't really do anything wrong, then you do sort of wonder, did he lose just because he's a Democrat?" Beatty said.

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